On Becoming An Award-Winning Math Presenter

For many students, math is hard. It starts out hard and haunts them for the rest of their lives. But many more students are overcoming math difficulties with TouchMath - some dramatically.

Consider the story of Karissa, a student at St. Benedict in Iowa. This determined girl remembers finally crossing the chasm between math frustration and math mastery.

Karissa's challenges began early, with flashcards in first grade. "We had to memorize math facts and practice with the teacher. It was hard for me, and scary. It took so long, and I just wanted to get done so I wouldn't have to do it again the next day."

Luckily Karissa's second-grade teacher was an enthusiastic TouchMath practitioner who helped her students master the TouchPoint approach. Reflecting on her breakthrough with TouchMath, Karissa recalls, "I felt that I was doing so much better at math, it really made me want to go to school!"

How important have these changes been? Just ask Karissa's mother, Lori. "Karissa just didn't like school until the second grade, and I think a lot of it was because math was so frustrating. School wasn't fun for her at all.

"Before TouchMath, Karissa was working with straight flashcards, which require memorization. If you don't get the answer in time, they lay the flashcard down. When you're singled out like that and everybody knows you're not catching on, it's very defeating. Once math became easier with TouchMath, she started succeeding."

But that's not all. Lori made sure that all three of her daughters used TouchMath. In the process, she discovered some of TouchMath's unexpected benefits. "The confidence they'd derived from TouchMath transferred to their music, sports and many other life experiences; they started having fun."

Karissa's entire family shared the satisfaction of her triumph over math difficulties when Karissa won a local 4H competition. Outperforming other 4H-ers who gave fine presentations on building birdhouses or making cream cheese, Karissa's presentation demonstrated how to solve problems with TouchMath.

Karissa remembers the contest well. "It's not easy to get people interested in math and hold their attention for 10 minutes. But I learned to like math, and I wanted everybody else who was listening to know how to do it too, so they would like math and be confident about themselves."

So that's why math isn't hard anymore for Karissa. And it doesn't have to be hard for your children either. Any child can learn to enjoy math like Karissa did - with TouchMath!